Make Your Own “Minion” Party Hats!

September 24, 2015September 24, 2015 ~ Kaitlyn @ Doing Dishes Making Wishes ~ Leave a comment

When Emmy told me she wanted a “Despicable Me” birthday party, I immediately hopped on Pinterest to get ideas. Scrolling through my happy place, I stumbled across this pin from Tidbits and Twine. I obviously freaked out inside, and decided then and there that I would have minion hats at this party. This party would not even happen without these hats. I literally envisioned every future party moment with kids wearing these hats. It was happening. The crazy-craft-lady-train had left the station and wasn’t returning until it was chock-full of minion hats.

It took a few hours of my life, some yellow construction party hats and a few craft supplies – but it was sooooo worth it to make these! The kids (And even some of the grown-ups!) went crazy for these hats. Many of our party guests still have them two months later. My own girls still have their two hats in dress-up rotation, and I have to admit, I am shocked how well they actually held up!

I definitely think you should consider making a few of these if a minion party is in your future! Here’s how:

How To Make Your Own “Minion” Party Hats

Step 1: Gather your supplies! You will need:

Plastic yellow construction party hats
Mason jar lids
Black pipe cleaners
Black electrical tape
White poster board
Black construction paper
Craft glue or Elmer’s glue
Hot glue gun/hot glue sticks
Scissors
1 quarter
Pencil

Step 2: Prep your eyeballs. 🙂

To make the pupils of the eyes, trace a quarter as many times as needed (You need 1 black circle per hat.) onto the black construction paper. Cut out the circles with some scissors. (You can fold the paper in half to get it done in half the time!)

Trace your mason jar lid as many times as needed (You need 1 white circle per hat.) onto the white poster board. Cut out the circles with some scissors.

Step 3: Assemble the eyeballs!

Get your white circles, black circles and mason jar lids together.

Use the craft glue to glue the white poster board circles onto the mason jar lids.

Then glue on the black construction paper circles.

Step 4: Put on the Minion goggles.

Plug in the hot glue gun, then get your mason jar rings back from the over-excited children that stole them.

Put a thin bead of hot glue around the inner lip of the ring and push the mason-jar-lid-turned-eyeball into it. Presto minion goggle eyes!

Step 5: Give your minions hair.

I decided to do Stuart’s hair and Kevin’s hair. We will start with Kevin.

For Kevin, use a sharp knife to cut 2 holes into the raised, center part on the top of the construction hat.

Feed 4 pipe cleaners into one hole and back out the other, so that the hair is sticking out the top of the hat.

The inside of the hat will look like the above picture, with the hair poking out the top of the hat.

Trim the pipe cleaners to the desired length, and arrange into Kevin’s style!

For Stuart, use a sharp knife to cut 2 holes on the top center of the hat, parallel to the raised, center part of the hat. Feed the pipe cleaners in one side and back out the other side.

Cut to the desired length and bend into the Stuart style.

Look how cute they are already! Eeee!

Step 6: Finish them up!

Grab the eyeball goggles we made earlier, black electric tape, scissors and your hats with hair.

Start by adhering your electric tape really well to one the side of the mason jar ring.

Apply the tape around the side of the hat. This makes the band for the minion goggles, while also holding the eyeball in place.

Run the tape around the whole hat. You don’t need to hold the eyeball in place while you tape around the whole hat.

Cut the tape once it is wrapped around the whole hat, leaving enough extra to attach to the other side of the mason jar lid.

Once you have attached the eyeball in place with the other side of tape, trim any excess tape off the ends and smooth it down.

Put a thin line of hot glue on the top and bottom of the mason jar lid, right where it sits on the hat. This will help hold your eyeball in place, in addition to the tape.

There you go! Minion hats. Boom. Done.

Now all you have to do is throw your party, and watch the kids go nuts! Party time!

🙂 Kaitlyn

Gru’s Shrunken Moon Cake Pops For A “Despicable Me” Party!

August 18, 2015August 18, 2015 ~ Kaitlyn @ Doing Dishes Making Wishes ~ Leave a comment

So anybody who has seen “Despicable Me” knows all about Gru’s mission to steal the moon. If you are not familiar – In order to steal the moon, Gru has to obtain a shrink ray and shrink the moon so that he can fit it in his pocket.

Emmy watches this movie at least once a week, and is now obsessed with the moon. She looks for it in the sky night and day, and stares at it in one of Avery’s books about the solar system. She also pretends a little plastic golf ball is her moon and carries it in her pocket.

(She is such a little weirdo, and I just love it! She flies her freak flag with no cares. Hey kid, what’s in your pocket? THE MOON. Obviously.)

So when I was searching Pinterest for “Despicable Me” party ideas, I came across this pin with a picture of shrunken moon pops. I knew I had to serve these up at Emmy’s party, because she is my little moon-obsessed minion wannabe!

I used my usual cake pop recipe, with chocolate cake on the inside and a white candy coating on the outside. It gave the pops a very moon-like look.

Read on to make your own shrunken moon cake pops!

Gru’s Shrunken Moon Cake Pops For A “Despicable Me” Party!

Ingredients:

1 box chocolate cake mix, prepared and baked according to the box directions.
1 8 oz block of cream cheese, softened at room temperature
2 packages of Wilton candy melts in white
1 package of lollipop sticks

What to do:

Grab your box of chocolate cake mix. Any brand will do. I used this one:

Prepare the mix according to the box directions and bake the cake.

Once the cake is baked, allow it too cool COMPLETELY before you move on to the next step.

Dump about 2/3 of the baked, cooled cake into the bowl of a mixer with a paddle attachment.

Add the block of softened cream cheese.

Mix on low until it all starts to come together.

Crumble the remaining 1/3 of your cake slowly into the mixing bowl. Continue to mix on low until the mixture resembles a crumbly play dough.

Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

*(Oh hey, Fitbit-on-my-wrist! So glad you made it into this post about cake mixed with cream cheese and dipped in candy.)*

Grab small handfuls of the chocolate cake dough and roll them between your hands to make balls. About 1 inch diameter for size seems to work well.

Once you have them all rolled, grab your lollipop sticks.

I got mine at Walmart, but you can also find them in most craft supply stores.

Poke a lollipop stick into each ball, about 3/4 of the way in. (You do not want them to poke through the other side, because your cake pops will fall apart when it is time to dip them in the candy coating.) Once they all have lollipop sticks, put them in the fridge for a few minutes while you prepare the candy coating.

Now grab your candy coating, and follow the directions on the package for melting.

I got mine at Walmart, but you can also find these in most craft supply stores.

I melt both packages together in the microwave in a medium glass bowl, but I follow the melting instructions on the package EXACTLY. Do not try to rush it, because they will seize up and become grainy – a.k.a. totally unusable. YOU WILL HAVE TO THROW THE WHOLE BATCH OUT. Just follow the instructions. I know it’s annoying. I know it seems like they will never melt on low power. I know it takes forever.

Just trust. OK? Good.

Dump the candy into your microwave safe bowl.

Follow the melting instructions. Pull it out and stir it well in-between each interval in the microwave.

Oh look! It is finallyyyy starting to melt.

Getting closer….Don’t give up now!

Thank God that finally happened. It is melted. Sheesh. Now add a splash of vegetable oil to the melted candy to thin it out a bit, and mix well. Grab your cake pops out of the fridge and start dipping! Try to swirl the pop out of the candy, so that it makes a more moon-like effect.

(I know this is blurry. Cody was gone on a business trip. I was dipping and swirling and trying to take pictures while the kids were running amok in the only-2-days-before-party-mayhem. Just be happy you even have this picture.)

As you dip them, place them back on the parchment paper. If the candy starts to get too thick, put it back in the microwave on low power for 15 second intervals until it is nice and melted again. You can also add another splash of vegetable oil to thin it out. Once they are all dipped and swirled, pop them back in the fridge until party time!

That tray was full of cake pop moons about 3 seconds before this picture was taken! Hopefully you can get a nice picture of yours before the minions attack and devour!

Enjoy!

🙂 Kaitlyn

How To Make Your Own “Minion” Pinata!

August 17, 2015August 17, 2015 ~ Kaitlyn @ Doing Dishes Making Wishes ~ Leave a comment

Kids love pinatas! Just something about whacking the crap out of a container full of candy until it breaks is magical. I have yet to meet a child that doesn’t absolutely go nuts over this. I always have one at my girls’ birthday parties. The price tag, however, does not agree with me. Most pre-made character pinatas run about $25. I might as well hang up my $25 and whack it to shreds with a stick, because that is such a huge waste of money!!!

Especially when you can make your own pinata for literally pennies.

Yep. I said pennies.

Want to know how to do it? Read on below!

How To Make Your Own “Minion” Pinata:

Before embarking on this adventure, plan ahead! While this is a super-easy process, you need to start making your pinata about 5 days before your party because he needs a couple nights to dry. (In other words, you have to go buy a $25.00 pre-made pinata if your party is tomorrow. Sorry. This is just not something that can be rushed.)

Step 1:

Gather your supplies. You will need:

2 balloons (It doesn’t matter which color because they won’t show.)
Some poster board
Tape
Newspaper, torn (not cut) into strips. (I just use the weekly sale ads that come in the mail for free.)
Flour
Water
String or rope (I used black parachute cord)
Assorted candy/small prizes of your choice
Spray paint in blue and yellow
Black pipe cleaners
Acrylic craft paint in white, black, and silver

Step 2:

Assemble the paper mache mold.

Inflate the two balloons, and cut the poster board into smaller pieces.

Line your poster board up into one big strip, and tape it all together.

Tape the 2 balloons together at the bottom.

Roll the balloons up in the poster board, attaching with tape as you go.

You might need a little helper to hold it still while you finish up the taping. 🙂

Step 3:

Prepare your paper mache station.

You need to mix the paper mache. For each coat you will need:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup water

Combine the flour and water until it is a nice, smooth paste. You should make sure you have plenty of newsprint torn into strips and your assembled mold ready to go. I didn’t cover my work space, because as long as you clean up while the paste is still wet it wipes off easily. If you are worried about the mess, then cover your work space with a plastic tablecloth or some extra newspaper.

Step 4:

Get your hands dirty, and start paper macheing!

Dip each strip of newsprint into the paste, run your fingers down it to wipe off the excess paste, then smooth it onto your mold. Repeat the process with each strip. Remember to saturate each piece, but wipe off as much of the extra paste as possible. If you use too much it will take forever to dry and could saturate the poster board, which will make your minion look warped.

Cris-crossing the strips makes a strong pinata. If you lay all the strips going the same direction, it will end up having weak spots.

Continue laying strips until you have no more openings. The entire piece should be covered in your first layer of paper mache, without being able to see any poster board or balloons. Resist the urge to keep paper macheing. If you make your first coat too thick it will take forever to dry. Let dry overnight.

Once dry, it will look like the picture above. Repeat the paper mache process and do a second coat over the entire piece. Allow the second coat to dry overnight again. If you are making the pinata for a large group of children or bigger kids, I recommend doing a third coat as well. If you have a smaller group or just little kids, 2 coats should be strong enough. (Remember to make sure you leave enough dry time between coats – overnight is best!)

Step 5:

Fill him up with candy and prizes!

When deciding what to fill your pinata with, consider your crowd. Little kids? Go with stickers and fruit snacks. Big kids? A good candy combo. Does anybody have allergies? Make sure your candy doesn’t contain nuts. So now that you have your treats picked out, let’s fill him!

Using a sharp knife, poke a hole into what will be the top of your pinata. Do not be alarmed when you hear the balloon begin to deflate inside! As long as you applied at least 2 coats of paper mache and allowed your pinata to dry properly, it will be very sturdy and hold it’s shape. Using a sawing motion with your knife, cut a flap big enough to fit your hand inside.

Deflate the other balloon, and pull the balloons out. These are a choking hazard. It is OK to leave the poster board inside. Dump all your candy and prizes inside. Now is also a good time to poke holes and attach the string your pinata will hang from. Poke 3 SMALL holes, surrounding the candy opening. Since my pictures for this didn’t turn out, I made you a diagram below.

Thread the string through each hole from outside to inside. Reach your hand inside and tie the end of each string into a giant knot, so that it can’t come back through the hole. Here is another #madpaintskillz diagram for you:

Once your candy is inside and the strings are attached for future hanging, close the flap back up with masking tape. Do one layer of paper mache over this entire top section to seal everything back up nice and cozy. Allow to dry – you guessed it – overnight.

Step 6:

Turn him into a minion!

Get your future minion, spray paint and a tarp. Spray the entire guy yellow. Apply multiple coats as needed, because your first coat will soak right into the paper mache. Mine took 2 full coats to cover the newspaper.

Allow to dry at least 2 hours, then tape off his top half. I just used masking tape and construction paper, because that was handy at the moment.

Spray his bottom half blue. Mine only took 1 coat of blue to be covered. Allow to dry another 2 hours.

Remove the paper and tape, and bring him inside to put his face on!

Use white craft paint for the eyes, and outline with silver craft paint for the goggles. Use the black craft paint to make his pupils, band for his goggles and a smiley mouth! Allow to dry. Then cut a small slit in the top of his head using a sharp knife. Poke pieces of black pipe cleaner into the slit, and bend them to resemble minion hair.

Step 7:

Hang him up and get the party started! The pinata rules we follow are:

Treat bags for candy/prize collection are labeled with names and passed out before the pinata starts
Birthday kid goes first
The other kids follow in age order from youngest to oldest
Each kid gets 3 hits, missed swings don’t count
Once the pinata breaks, it is every man for himself
I always keep some extra candy/prizes to the side in case some little kids get boxed out and don’t get to grab any candy

Be ready for the chaos once he breaks! Ahhhh! So fun!

Aren’t you glad that didn’t cost you $25.00?!

Have fun, you party animals!

🙂 Kaitlyn

How to Make Your Own “Despicable Me” Party Banner

August 14, 2015 ~ Kaitlyn @ Doing Dishes Making Wishes ~ Leave a comment

I love cute banners at kids’ parties! They just add so much to the decoration factor. I especially love them when they are personalized! The only downfall to a personalized banner is spending the money. Maybe I am just cheap, but it costs waaaay too much to order one. I am literally going to have this thing hanging in my house for the 3 short hours a kid’s party lasts, and it is going to cost me $30.00?! That’s like paying the banner $10 an hour to just hang out and look pretty! The easy way around is this to make your own. The supplies cost under $10 for everything – even less if you use some craft supplies that you already have. Bonus mom points: Your kids can help you make it, and feel extra special when they look around their party at the cool decor the contributed. They get so excited, and it’s super cute!

Want to know how to do it? Follow the instructions below!

How to Make Your Own “Despicable Me” Party Banner

Step 1:

Gather your supplies.

You will need:

Fun foam in 2 colors of your choice. I chose yellow and blue since our party had lots of minions, so yellow and blue went best with our take on the “Despicable” theme.
- I like making banners from fun foam. It doesn’t curl in outdoor humidity, and can even withstand a rain shower or getting splashed from the pool. (You can substitute regular poster board if you know your banner won’t get wet or the party will be inside.)
String or ribbon of your choice
- I used black parachute cord because I had some left over from other crafts. Any kind of string, yarn or ribbon will work, but keep in mind it will show so you want it to match.
A ruler
- I have a measuring tape pictured above, mainly because I couldn’t find my ruler. Craft supplies literally disappear and reappear at their own will around here.
Scissors
Elmer’s glue
Sticker letters
- You can find these at any craft supply store. They are a little pricey, but I use them for a lot of random crafts so I grab them at Michael’s with a 40% off coupon when I have one.
Minion stickers
- Totally optional, but the more minions we had at our party the better!

STEP 2:

Decide what you want your banner to say, and how you want it to be displayed.

You will have 1 letter per triangle piece on your banner, so you need to decide this before you start to cut everything out. Since the party was a “Despicable Me” theme and Emmy was turning 3, I thought a banner saying “DESPICABLE THREE” would be cute. I decided that it would say “DESPICABLE” on the top line and “THREE” on the bottom line with 2 extra blue triangles on each side for Emmy to stick minion stickers. So I knew I would need to cut out 15 yellow triangles and 17 blue triangles.

STEP 3:

Measure and cut out your banner pieces.

I chose just regular triangles for my banner pieces because they are easy. You are going to want to size your triangles based on the size of letters you have. Since the letters I had were 2 inch letters, I made the top triangles 3 inches wide at the top and 4 inches long from the top to the bottom tip of the triangle.

Then I followed the same process with the bottom triangles. I wanted about a half inch of the bottom blue triangles to show, so I made them 1 inch bigger. They ended up being 4 inches wide at the top and 5 inches long from the top to the bottom tip of the triangle.

STEP 4:

Glue the pieces together.

Apply a decent amount of Elmer’s glue to the back of the yellow triangle. Then stick the 2 triangles together.

Instead of centering the yellow I dropped it down a little bit so that I had some extra room to thread the parachute cord through the top later. Keep gluing all the pieces together until you have all 15 done.

Step 5:

Allow them to dry for a couple hours.

STEP 6:

Stick on your letters.

The brand I use is called “mambiSTICKS”. I have used them on countless craft projects. You can find these at Michael’s for $7.99 per pack or get them cheaper with a coupon! Gotta love those 40% off coupons!

Carefully stick the letters on the center of each banner piece. A couple of the letters hung over the edge of the yellow towards the bottom point of the triangle. (You can kind of see what I mean on the letter “h” above.) I used scissors to just trim the little end that didn’t fit. If you want to avoid running into this, just make your triangles a little bigger in step 3.
This is also when I had Emmy stick her minion stickers of choice onto the 2 blank triangles next to the “THREE”.

STEP 7:

Now it is time to assemble your banner!

Poke a very small hole (I just use the tip of my scissors) in the 2 top corners of each triangle. The hole should be small enough that the fun foam will hold tight on the cord once it’s threaded (it shouldn’t be able to slide around on it’s own), but you should be able to gently slide the piece along the thread without any problem. I don’t have pictures of how to thread the cord, because I was home by myself with 2 crazy kids and needed both hands to do this task. I did draw you a handy diagram with my mad paint skills. Here it is:

The cord should come up through the hole on the left, run across the top, and go back through the hole on the right. Do each piece for the top row of the banner, in “DESPICABLE” order, and leave plenty of extra cord on each end for hanging. Repeat for the bottom row, on a new, separate string. Do one minion sticker triangle, followed by “THREE”, and finish with the other minion sticker triangle.

STEP 8:

Hang her up!

When it is time to hang the banner, I recommend doing the top row first. Make sure it is centered, and do not let it droop too much because you have another row that will be beneath it. Hang the bottom row next. Gently adjust the letters so that everything is centered and evenly spaced. Then take a step back and admire your cute little banner that is all yours for less than $10.00!

PARTY TIME!!!

😉 Kaitlyn

Doing Dishes Making Wishes

conquering womanhood, one sink full at a time

despicable me party

Make Your Own “Minion” Party Hats!

Gru’s Shrunken Moon Cake Pops For A “Despicable Me” Party!

How To Make Your Own “Minion” Pinata!

How to Make Your Own “Despicable Me” Party Banner